oikos Spring Meeting is the second big annual event of the oikos community to gather together with approximately 60 – 100 participants. The first Spring meeting took place in 2010 in Reims. Every year it is at a different place, hosted by different local chapters, who also choose the topic of the conference. The goal of the meeting is to connect the community, to network, to get inspired, to share thoughts on the topic and outside, and to learn from each other. This year the oikos Spring Meeting 2019 was hosted from 15 March to 18 March 2019 in Belgrade, Serbia, with the main focus on Sustainable Urbanism. Belgrade is a great example of rapid expansion of a city through extensive urban planning, which had failed to foresee many environmental issues arising from such a development. Many decades later, the city is reaching close to 2 million inhabitants, with shrinking green spaces, inefficient infrastructure, high pollution and an inefficient public transport based mostly on fossil fuels. Of course, Belgrade is not alone in this, as many cities, especially in Eastern Europe and Asia, all face similar problems, following decades of industrialization and a lack of environmental awareness. The goal of the event was to gather oikos members from all over the world to get more familiar with the issue, exchange their ideas and work together towards raising awareness and looking into possible solutions. oikos Spring Meeting 2019 featured many lectures, panels and workshops with interesting speakers and some of the renowned experts in the field.
Dr Marija Maruna – Faculty of Architecture, University of Belgrade Dr Ksenija Lalović – Faculty of Architecture, University of Belgrade Dr Vladimir Đurđević – Faculty of Physics, University of Belgrade Đorđe Samardžija – Zero-Carbon world advocate, Founder of One Degree Serbia Ivan Jovanović – CEDEF Projects Coordinator Aleksandar Macura – Program Director for Energy at RES Foundation Doc Dr Mladen Đurić – Faculty of Organizational Science, University of Belgrade Nemanja Backović – Speaker at Faculty of Organizational Science Danijela Božanić – Lead National Consultant for the Green Climate Fund Prof Dr Dejan Molnar – Faculty of Economics, University of Belgrade The oikos Spring Meeting 2019 will bring together a diverse representation from the entire oikos community and will allow in-depth discussions and exchange. From oikos Belgrade we cordially invite active and motivated student members from oikos chapter network, alumni, faculty, advisors and partners.
The oikos Spring Meeting 2019 will offer professional and personal enriching experiences and the most active and committed oikos members are invited to take the best out of it. We aim for the community to actively participate in the event. Chapter presidents are invited to select their chapters’ most active members and encourage them to apply. Since there are usually more applications than spaces, the organizing team may select chapter members. We encourage you to register now: CLICK HERE Registration Deadline: 12th January 2019
Student participant fee is 90€, to be paid only after acceptance of your application. The fee includes: Cancellation: ▪ A refund will be given for cancellations received 20 days before the first day of the conference. The cancellation fee is 20 EUR. ▪ No refund will be given for cancellations received later than 19 days before the start of the conference. Payment deadline 1st Round: 10th December 2018 You can make your payment via Bank transfer or PayPal (Credit Card). Bank Transfer: Kindly find our bank details here. * When paying your participants fee via paypal, paypal charges a fee according to the amount of transfered money. This is why you have to pay a bit more, so that we finally get the 90 EUR / 200 EUR
The Spring Meeting 2019 gathers representatives from the entire community. Therefore, you, alumnus/a, faculty member, young scholar, advisor of one of our chapters or partner are cordially invited to register. Register now: click here Registration deadline: 25th November 2018 If you need a visa, we encourage you to apply before the deadline.
The participation fee for non-student members is 200€ for all Spring Meeting Belgrade events, including accommodation, food, transportation (in Belgrade, except from or to the airport) and extra activities (tourism, parties, etc.). In case you want to stay in another hotel, please reserve your own accommodation, but fee will not variate. Please make the payment only after acceptance of your application. Cancellation: ▪ A refund will be given for cancellations received 20 days before the first day of the conference. The cancellation fee is 20 EUR. ▪ No refund will be given for cancellations received later than 19 days before the start of the conference. Payment deadline: 10th December 2018 You can make your payment via Bank transfer or PayPal (Credit Card). Bank Transfer: Kindly find our bank details here. * When paying your participants fee via paypal, paypal charges a fee according to the amount of transfered money. This is why you have to pay a bit more, so that we finally get the 90 EUR / 200 EUR General Questions:
Every member of any oikos Chapter, Alumni, Faculty, Young Scholars, Advisors, Partners, EB Members and board members are invited to join the Spring Meeting.
Two would be the ideal number of members from each chapter. In case there is an excess of applicants from your chapter, you will be put on a waitlist and we will evaluate the application when the minimum representation criteria from each chapter has been fulfilled.
As a chapter representative, you can check in on Friday 15th of March in Belgrade and check out on the morning of March 18th. If you are a Faculty, a Partner, Alumni or Advisor, the Spring Meeting opening session start on Thursday at 18.30 pm. For accommodation, we recommend you to stay with us at the hotel to share the experience with other participants. We also got a great deal at this hotel and if you would like to, we can reserve your accommodation for you. If you have any questions, please contact us at springmeeting@oikos-belgrade.org to help you with your schedule.
Unfortunately, we don’t provide any travel reimbursement.
The information will be confirmed soon. In the meantime, please feel free to contact us in case you have any queries.
If you register and you are accepted but finally you can not attend to the Spring Meeting you must not pay the fee, we will assign your slot to someone from the waiting list in the 2nd round following the minimum representation criteria we had established. Payment Questions:
The deadline for making payments is December 10.
Yes, you would be paying via Paypal. The link from where you can make the payment is given on our website.
Yes, you can make the payment via bank transfer as well. Following are our account details that you’ll need: IBAN: CH78 0025 4254 6301 7740 Y BIC (Swift): UBSWCHZH80A Account Number: 254-630177.40Y Clearing Number: 00254 Beneficiary Name: OIKOS International Dufourstrasse 50, 9000 St. Gallen Beneficiary Bank: UBS AG, Postfach, CH 9001 St Gallen
Yes, oikos Members need to make a payment of 90 EUR in order to attend the oikos Spring Meeting. 90 EUR covers your accommodation and food during the event. You are responsible for travel expenses from your home city to Belgrade and back. Alumni, young scholars, faculty, advisers, and partners are required to pay 200 EUR. This includes food during the event, but not accommodation
The fee includes: Logistical Questions:
The participants will be staying in one of three hostels located in Belgrade city center: Downtown Central Hostel Belgrade
Public Transportation: Bus Line 72: Nikola Tesla Airport>Zeleni Venac Terminus Price: Express Bus Line A1: Nikola Tesla Airport>Slavija Square Taxi: Taking a taxi ride to the city centre should cost between 1600 and 1800RSD(~13-15.5€)
Theme: Sustainable Tourism and Mobility Date: 8-11 March 2018 Location: Barcelona (Spain) Please find more information here: https://oikos-international.org/spring-meeting-2018/
Theme: Sustainable Consumption Date: 23-26 March 2017 Location: Hamburg (Germany) Organising team: Pauline Sprenger, Franziska Straten and team; in collaboration with Anita Negri and Levan Pangani of oikos International. Contact us at: springmeeting@oikos-hamburg.org
Theme: Creating an Entrepreneurial Mindset (#EntreMind) Date: 17-20 March 2016 Location: Lille (France) Organising team: Francois Lebrun, Myriam Masso, Yazid Sayah, Omar Riffi, Anais Viviche and Alice Alamasset; in collaboration with Anita Negri of oikos International. For updates: Facebook Contact us at: springmeeting@oikos-lille.org The Spring Meeting 2016 will take place in the very north of France, Lille. Being a centre of responsible and sustainable entrepreneurship, the oikos Lille team decided to construct a programme which will allow participants to get in touch with local entrepreneurs and experts in the field. Participants will also engage in a simulation game throughout the three days and enhance their social entrepreneurial mindset via external and internal inspiration. The programme will soon be featured on oikos-lille.org.
Theme: Sustainability in Finance Date: 26th-29th March 2015 Location: London (United Kingdom) Organising team: Connor Brooks, Moritz Schwarz, Nasir Ibrahim, Nathanael Didillon, Oliver Lysaght, Pierre Dupuis, Pierre Lostis, Shino Hirasaki; in collaboration with Anita Negri of oikos International. For updates: Twitter and Facebook Contact us at: spring.meeting@oikos-london.org The 2015 oikos Spring Meeting will be hosted in London between March 26th and 29th 2015. It will bring together 120 students from across the globe to enquire, think and talk about the relationship between finance and sustainability alongside LSE students and expert speakers. We will examine this relationship from two angles: firstly looking at the sustainability of our financial system. Influential speakers such as Bernard Lietaer and Ben Dyson will introduce us to inbuilt instabilities in the current financial system and offer recommendations on enhancing its stability and capacity to benefit society. We will, secondly, look at how to finance sustainable development, recognising that to encourage sustainability in society, financial flows must be galvanised to this end. The London spring meeting will offer a diagnosis of issues and recommendations from a variety of actors in moving forward which will amount to a deeply informative experience. We look forward to having you!
Here are some impressions of oikos Spring Meetings.
The oikos Spring Meeting is the biggest annual oikos student community gathering hosted by an oikos Chapter. The 2014 Spring Meeting in Copenhagen is going to provide a 4-day platform for 120 participants to inspire, discover and develop joint perspectives on the future of sustainability in management and economics. It will offer a platform to design initiatives, engage the oikos community in pursuing them and fuel our journey towards higher impact. The oikos Spring Meeting 2014 will take place on 3 – 6 April in Copenhagen. As Copenhagen is awarded the European Green Capital for 2014 by the European Commission, this year’s theme is „Sustainable Cities: Challenges and Strategies“. We have planned for you seminars, workshops and panel discussions in relation to the theme. As a platform focused on solutions and action, the oikos Spring Meeting 2014 will offer insights to learn together and develop impact-full projects and initiatives in oikos. Apart from that, there will also be a lot of social activities and we will have lots of fun! More information here: Website: https://oikos-international.org/copenhagen/projects/conference/about-us/
Theme: Sustainable Investment Date: 14th-17th March 2013 Location: Maastricht (The Netherlands) Organising team: Anita Negri, Lotta Lichtenberger, Florian Lorisch, Katja Wachter, Floor van der Geest and helpers; in collaboration with Lenka Parkanova and Dawid Wroblewski of oikos International. For updates: Facebook and Twitter Contact us at: spring.meeting@oikos-maastricht.org (+31 433885298) “Our real problem, then, is not our strength today; it is rather the vital necessity of action today to ensure our strength tomorrow” – D.D. Eisenhower During the Spring Meeting, oikees will have the opportunity to dive deep into sustainable investment and topics that fall close to or within it such as corporate governance, sustainable banking or responsible investment. The aim of the Spring Meeting is to allow participants to gain a deeper understanding of the mentioned topics by engaging in individual and group projects, consulting experts and hands on experiences. All this is expected to be enhanced by the atmosphere that the 2013 Spring Meeting aims to provide: an international and multicultural environment where networking is key to exchanging ideas. The IISD claims that it is difficult to pin down an exact definition for sustainable investment. When one invests sustainably, they intend to plan for both the present and the future. The integration of ESG factors (Environment, Social factors and Governance) is essential, ensuring a long-term investment strategy.
oikos Spring Meeting Barcelona 2012 The objective of the oikos Spring Meeting 2012 is to gather international community of oikos members with an aim to share ideas and perspectives on the future of Mobility and to enable exchange of experiences from locally organised projects. The Meeting is going to be held at the ESADE University in Sant Cugat (Barcelona) from 29th March to 1st April 2012. Topic This year we have decided to talk about Sustainable Mobility because it is a current and interesting topic that recognises the challenges related to transportation, shipment of goods and general communication. It is a concept born from the concern for environmental and social problems caused by the spread of an urban transport model, focused on the petrol-fueled cars, which developed during the second half of the twentieth century. The problems of this model include: air pollution, excessive consumption of energy, side-effects harmful for citizen’s health and overcrowded roads. In Spain, for instance, transport represents a quarter of the gas emission and 36% of the Spanish energy consumption. The above have triggered a collective will to find solutions which would mitigate the negative effects of this model and to develop a new, alternative one. Concepts of Sustainable Mobility suggest actions that help to reduce those negative effects. Examples of these responsible practices are as follows: forward-looking urban planning; travelling on foot, by bike or with public transport; sharing a car with co-workers; replacing abroad meetings with teleconferences and many more. We will try to equip you with a proper knowledge and awareness that will enable you, oikos change agents, to promote appropriate lifestyles and also recognise the opportunities that still stand before corporate world, public administration or shipment companies. Activities oikos Spring Meeting in Sant Cugat will be a feast for mind and spirit. Series of content driven sessions as well as fun, hands-on projects await you. Already excited? Keep on reading 😉 Friday will be opened with visits in one of two exceptional companies: Seat (car factory with an assembly line of electric vehicles) or bicing (Barcelona’s bike renting scheme). Afterwards, for the rest of the day, we will move to Barcelona’s Botanic Garden. We will dive into a series of oikos sessions: “Legislative meeting”, “Chapter Fair” and the “Peer2peer”. Then, at 16:00, we will listen to a serious Panel Discussion in which we will assess the current state and also predict 2020 scenario for Mobility worldwide. Finally, before having lunch, we will invite you for a night-tour of Barcelona, which will be concluded with a Flashmob performance. Of course you can also count on a Barcelona-style oikos Party on Saturday’s night! The prospects for this event are really high and we expect that it is going to be an event without precedence, very enriching intellectually and spiritually. Your oikos Barcelona team. On September 7-9 oikos Tbilisi, together with Ivane Javakhishvili Tbilisi State University has organized CEE Regional Meeting on the topic – “Sustainable Agritourism” in Tbilisi, Georgia.
Theme: Sustainable Architecture: Space for Living Date: 24th-27th March 2011 Location: Prague Organising Team: Stepan Trojanek and team (oikos Prague) Harriet Jackson and Patricia Mesquita (oikos International) For updates Join this event on Facebook or on Ning Contact: stepan.trojanek@oikos-prague.org harriet.jackson@oikosinternational.org Sustainable Architecture: Space for Living Architecture is an important element of our lives, shaping the environment where we spend most of our time. As such, it is certainly worthy of our attention, as it significantly influences our health, productivity or comfort and the quality of life itself. At the same time, heating, ventilating and air conditioning of buildings require considerable amounts of energy and contribute to our overall carbon emissions. In fact, studies show that building insulation is one of the most cost-efficient measures we can adopt in our struggle against climate change. During the oikos Spring Meeting in Prague, oikos members from around the world will have the opportunity to find out more about architecture from the sustainability perspective. They will learn about current trends and technologies and will be able to actually see real-life applications. Besides the new, the now obsolete buildings and areas such as brownfields and their current potential will not be forgotten. Together, we will also try to look into the future and what solutions are going to be necessary in face of changing conditions. Last but not least, we will explore alternative approaches to architecture and challenge the mainstream thinking. All this in an unforgettable setting of Prague with its rich architectural heritage which should provide a contrast to current trends and help us see the issues from long-term historical perspective.
Sustainable Marketing: goals and processes Marketing seems to make sustainable development more and more fashionable. Is it the evidence that our consumption becomes gradually respectful of the environment? Organising Team Date and place: 25-28 March 2010, Reims, France
Participant Fee (in EUR)
Chapter Member €100.00 EUROther Participants €210.00 EUR
First and Last Name
Participant Fee (in EUR)
Chapter Member €100.00 EUROther Participants €210.00 EUR
First and Last Name
Zvezdana VuletićProject HeadSpring Meeting 2019
Stefan DedovićProject ManagerSpring Meeting 2019
Darija MiletićHead of Operations and LogisticsSpring Meeting 2019
Stefan KrasićHead of Marketing and CommunicationSpring Meeting 2019
Kristina StevanovićHead of Sponsorships and FundraisingSpring Meeting 2019
Aleksandra VučetićProject Coordinator & Head of FinanceSpring Meeting 2019
Andrijana VučićevićLogistics ManagerSpring Meeting 2019
We expect participation of about 100 students from all over the world, especially from Europe, who are going to stay in hostels situated in the centre of Barcelona.
Participants are arriving on Thursday morning and we are going to start with the “ice-breaker” session on the midday so that participants would socialise and get to know each other. In the afternoon we will get first insights into the topic of Sustainable Mobility that will prepare us for an on-site investigation of mobility related solutions implemented in Sant Cugat, where ESADE campus is based. It will be a guided walk around the city, lead by representatives of City Hall, experts form the field and members of oikos Barcelona. Finally, after a dinner, we’ll be screening a movie related to the meeting’s theme.
On Sunday morning we are going to have the first workshop session, in which teams of oikees will be analysing cases related to teleconferencing, infrastructure for electric vehicles, car sharing, corporate car-pooling or will try to solve some of ESADE’s burning problems. Between those sessions, we’ll be planting trees in ESADE garden – activity that shall be both educational and entertaining. After a day of such an intense brainstorming, we will move to Barcelona where as an oikos biking gang we will cycle along Barcelona’s coast line.
This year’s oikos Spring Meeting will be held in Reims – a city in the heart of the Champagne region of France. The theme of the Spring Meeting 2010, “Sustainable Marketing: Goals and Processes”, aims at further understanding how marketing can be sustainable.
We are facing today a range of environmental issues: pollution, loss of biodiversity and climate change, many of them having roots in the way we consume. Sustainable marketing is a process of using traditional marketing tools for products that respect the environment and ecosystems. Thus, sustainable marketing fosters a change in consumption patterns.
Sustainable marketing is used not only by companies with strong corporate social responsibility (CSR) practices but also by some pioneering companies which proved that moving towards more sustainable marketing practices can be a shrewd business move. For many, operating in an ethically and environmentally responsible way proves to be a cost-effective strategy to win new customers. In addition, sustainable marketing practices often make a company more attractive for investments thus enabling easier funding. At the same time, sustainable marketing also contributes to sustainable development since it encourages a more responsible consumption.
Visiting students will be able to meet companies that promote sustainable development through their products while remaining profit-making entities. The students will also have an opportunity to enjoy an eco-fashion show. Moreover, since Reims is in the region where champagne is produced, visiting students will be introduced to organic champagne.
However, sustainable marketing does not always mean a sustainable supply chain: visiting students will be able to participate in various workshops to discuss controversial issues around sustainable marketing.